Dining and Food

By Bazaar Staff 01/04/2018

ACT TWO, SCENE WON

Celebrating exciting new items at Scene Café Bloomingdale's Kuwait

Bazaar Goes Dining

You can’t be a trendsetter without forever being on the go, constantly bettering yourself to stay ahead of the game, always excited to offer new and fresh ideas. Bloomingdale’s, with 145 years of luxury experience of being “like no other store in the world”, is celebrating its first anniversary in Kuwait with a new launch of its own, or, more accurately lunch…

Ever stylish and popular, Scene Café is springing into the new season with a scrumptious new menu. Whether you are rewarding yourself with another treat at the end of a Bloomingdale’s Experience Beauty spa indulgence, stopping mid-day for a break to deliberate and cogitate your latest fashion purchase, or fueling up to get you through a full day’s retail therapy with your own Personal Shopper, there will be something ideally suited for you to enjoy on the menu.

Always up for the challenge, bazaar proceeded to give all of it a taste; breakfast, lunch, dinner, desserts…we can’t get enough of this café with the reputation of being “the place to see and be Scene”.

Approaching the café, we can see that it is light and airy, with the exterior floor-to-ceiling glass allowing you to see all the way through to the back wall and patisserie showcase, privacy coming with the full-length delicate drapery. The white base and grey veins of the Carrara marble table tops are the perfect backdrop for your Instagram flat-lays and adds a touch of class to any photographic composition.

If you consider the interior design, like the modern tube chandeliers, the display cabinet of crystal decanters and the smart, upholstered furniture, some of the beautiful fixtures and fittings are more reminiscent of an apartment, and you can really picture yourself hanging out in a luxurious and extravagant New York residence. Indeed, like the one in Friends, Bloomingdale’s refers to the exterior seating of Scene Café as a “roof terrace” as you get the light from 360 MALL’s domed skylight and it feels like you are outside. You get a great view of the inside of the luxury department store from here too, so your eyes can still wander into Bloomingdale’s while you relax in Scene Café!

Melbourne millionaire Tim Gurner asserted that, “spending too much on avocado toast” is the real reason why millennials can’t afford to buy houses. Certainly, most will gladly keep on living in a corner of their parents’ basements if it means being able to enjoy Scene Café’s twist on the popular breakfast dish. While dainty, it demands attention with the guacamole sharply citrus, creamy and full of flavor and the poached eggs ready to burst with warm runny yolk. Slices of red chili add a touch of contrasting color to this beautifully plated item.

There is a great variety of breakfast items on the menu, and if you don’t want to share but still fancy sampling lots of them, the full breakfast is highly recommended. A wonderful way to start the day with grilled halloumi, poached eggs, beef bacon, juicy tomatoes, fritters of zucchini and eggplant, a mound of juicy, herbed mushrooms and to top it all off a cute mini shakshuka. We also tried the Eggs Benedict with its sharp Hollandaise sauce and it must be said if you love a poached egg, they are masters of the technique at Scene Café.

Perhaps you may require something sweet to give you a boost to face the 3 floors of shopping ahead of you in Bloomingdale’s. TheSalted Banoffee French Toast is exactly what the doctor ordered. The burnt-sugar of the caramel enhances the sweetness and the flavor of the bananas and the thick slices of airy brioche drizzled with sauce keep the dessert indulgently rich but not heavy.

To accompany breakfast, several freshly made fruit juices are available, but we tried the refreshing Black Cinnamon Mojito cocktail packed with mint and garnished with one whole cinnamon stick. The classic mojito is gently lemony and the Berry Berry super fruity. The short Passion Walk cocktail looks lovely with a slice of passion fruit floating on the juice with a sugared rim. It was difficult not to overindulge with these dishes and drinks but we had hardly started the tasting, with many more mains and dessert still to savor.

Rainbow Quinoa Salad. Courtesy of Bloomingdale’s

Where would we be without quinoa and what on earth could a Rainbow Quinoa salad be? This colorful concoction packs a powerful punch of vitamins, minerals and omega-3 with goodies like roasted broccoli, avocado, fennel, peppers, edamame, and chia seeds present. It’s a very healthy portion too, so good to share. Keeping in line with healthier options, the Whole Baby Chicken came next. Cut into chunks, you can see the sear marks on the sides. This plateful is served with colorful bell peppers.

A test of a great kitchen is the lamb chops and these are not disappointing. Marinated with more than 10 spices, they remained flavorsome throughout the cooking process. We were happily surprised that they came cooked to perfection, exactly as ordered. Well done, Chef! Tender-stem broccoli with a little crunch and on the side is an understated yet elegant companion to the lamb.

If the ever so popular Oprah says, “This is the joy for me. I love bread!” it is good enough for bazaar. Scene Café’s famous Feta and Ricotta bread rolls are a joy indeed. Fully stuffed, the bread is served to tear-and-share with a miniature bottle of sugar syrup to pour on top.

Cheese and Honey Flatbread at Scene Café. Courtesy of Bloomingdale’s

The age-old pairing of cheese and honey also makes for a very satisfying flatbread, and there is no sparing of the kashkaval cheese in this offering. If bread is just too much of a jump in the wrong direction for you, the sweet potato fries are another option. A complex carbohydrate with vitamin A and protein, it’s seems rude not to order these fluffy-on-the-inside fries. You can also choose to have these super-loaded if you fancy being a little naughty!

Garlic Chili Prawns is next. With the tail on and paired with roasted cherry tomatoes, the prawns are tossed in fresh chili, and this is the dish for you if you like a little spice in your life. It’s as pleasing to the palate as it is on the eye and the texture of the shellfish is just perfect; succulent and juicy.

For the vegetarians out there, you will be delighted to learn that the surprise of the menu that everyone couldn’t get enough of was the Zucchini Lasagne. With only one sheet of pasta, this too is deconstructed with the tomato sauce and white cheese on the side. The lasagne is made with layers of kale (that is so moist it looks like spinach) between layers of ricotta cheese the final vegetable layer being thinly sliced zucchini. This is so tasty you will want to order this only for yourself, no sharing here!

Scene Café Desserts. Courtesy of Bloomingdale’s

A dessert called The Garden is an intrigue we were all trying to guess. Surely with Bloomingdale’s at the helm it would be nothing less than sensational. We oohed and ahhed with the realization of what was in this prettily presented dessert. A plated embankment of strawberries, quenelle of ice cream on a bed of crumbed biscuit, pink mini-meringues and piped whipped cream. This deconstructed Eton Mess is as light as it is vigorously fruity.

“There’s always room for ice cream, it just goes in the holes in-between what you’ve just eaten” a wise man used to say.

By reputation the Cinnamon Ice Cream and pastries are crucial to a Scene experience and, along with the ice cream, a selection from the patisserie was sent our way, all creamy or gold leaf decorated, fruity or chocolatey. We looked forward to this spread of desserts being the apotheosis of our gastronomic adventures. We were not disappointed and devoured the lot.

Scene Café is located at Bloomingdale’s Kuwait, at 360 MALL. For more information, please call 2229 9800, and follow @BloomingdalesMe on Instagram for the latest updates.